


I am James (And I am in control)

by Valeks_princess



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-17
Updated: 2016-11-17
Packaged: 2018-08-31 11:55:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8577595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Valeks_princess/pseuds/Valeks_princess
Summary: "I don't... Prove it" The Black Widow smiled and pulled him close, whispering into his ear the words they've never outwardly said to each other. James smiled, a lopsided grin breaking out of his stoic mask for a split second before he tangled his hands in her hair and kissed her. There were a series of gasps in the background and someone began laughing. Natasha broke the kiss and flipped them off."Screw you Rogers, I didn't make a deal when you and Stark got together"





	

"Longing, rusted, furnace, daybreak" As soon as Bucky realised what was happening he tried to cover his ears, to escape the words that worked to dredge his programming back up, to take control of his mind, but it was too late.  
No Bucky thought desperately, forcing himself to fight the brain washing, I am James Buchanan Barnes I am in control of myself.  
"Seventeen, benign" the HYDRA scientist rattled off the words at a furious clip, knowing that they were his only chance to escape with his life.  
"Nine" I am James Buchanan Barnes and I am in control of myself.  
"Homecoming" I am James Barnes and I am in control of myself.  
"One" I am James and I am in control.  
"Freight car" In some small, lost part of his own mind Bucky screamed.  
"Soldier?" The pudgy scientist asked tentatively, wringing his small hands together as he studied the man before him, seemingly obedient and pliable.  
"Ready to comply" the Winter Soldier responded stoically, voice like gravel, face emotionless. 

The rest of the avengers swore over their comms. The mission had been simple, get in and out, leaving behind one dead scientist. It would've usually been left for Strike Team Delta, no need to involve the whole team, but their target had gone to ground in a fortified stronghold, taking some very dangerous tech with him. 

The scientist grinned wickedly; ever an opportunist, his ambitions went from getting out of here alive to getting revenge on the heroes that had collapsed his organisation and threatened his life.  
"Kill them all" 

"What's the plan Cap?" Tony asked, circling the compound.  
"Can you see him?"  
"Gimme a sec" Tony swooped low "I got eyes on him, east wing heading straight for you"  
"Good, hang back I'll see if I can reason with him"  
"Steve I'm coming to you" Natasha announced suddenly, startling Steve, who had all but forgotten about her beyond keeping track of the whereabouts of his team.  
"No, let me take care this, he's my best friend, I can snap him out of it" he assured her. Natasha wasn't convinced. She knew the deadly machine that was the Winter Soldier, and that knowledge was enough to terrify a lesser woman, yet she also knew how to chip away at his programming; to bring him back to himself- not fully, not Bucky, but just enough that he remembered he was her James. Steve, however, had no way of returning the Soldier to his precious Bucky short of bashing him over the head enough times to scramble his brain which- Nazi-Soviet imitation serum or not, was not healthy. So the Widow ignored the Captain's orders and changed her course, heading away from where she was meant to be watching for the scientist, intending to intervene before Steve had need to engage the Winter Soldier.

Within seconds of this resolution Steve found Bucky.  
"Listen Buck" Steve began, before being promptly tossed against a wall, concrete cracking with the force of the impact. The Soldier had had the opportunity to snap his neck in the manoeuvre, but dismissed the man in the gaudy red, white and blue as a lesser threat compared to the deadly spider he knew was nearby, simply batting the man aside as he readied himself for the real fight.  
"That didn't work" Tony remarked, anxiously hovering above the two men, ready to defy his Captain's orders if it came to saving his life "I've got a lock on him, do I shoot?"  
"No!" Steve said, outraged that Tony would think of shooting his best friend, rising from the pile of rubble that until recently was a concrete wall.  
"I wasn't gonna kill him" Tony protested, hoping that Steve couldn't tell that it was a lie "just slow him down a little"  
"Just let me handle this alright?" Steve asked, moving towards Bucky again. 

Steve, as it turned out, couldn't handle it. He could barely hold his own against the Winter Soldier and soon he was pinned to the ground, a blade approaching his throat. The Soldier had taken the star spangled man's refusal to stay down as warranting an actual response, and wanted to dispose of him quickly, to allow him to set an ambush for the Widow.  
"Steve?" Tony asked, voice all but breathy with fear, begging permission to take out the man coming ever closer to slicing through Steve's jugular.  
"No" Steve grunted, using all his supersoldier strength to keep the knife from his throat. Just as the legendary strength of Captain America began to flag, as Tony- prohibited from shooting Bucky, readied himself to tackle him off Steve, and the Winter Soldier began to gain momentum and the knife got closer and closer to his throat, Natasha intervened, leaping onto Bucky, locking her legs around his torso, and jabbing her Widow's Bite's into the side of his neck. The voltage made the muscles of his neck and shoulder twitch with minor electric shocks but, trained as he was against her attacks, wasn't incapacitated. He stood from his position over Steve and, dismissing the man entirely, threw the Black Widow off of him. Tony breathed out a sigh of relief and, buzzing around the scene below like an annoying fly, afraid to intervene, demanded that everyone else to make their way here as fast as they could, knowing that despite his assurances to the contrary Cap was outmatched.

The Winter Soldier swung at Natasha, a move she easily avoided. She was expecting the attack; he was testing her, his programming, reminding him that she was just as deadly as he was, pushing him to eliminate her. The Soviets, once they had discovered the illicit romance between their most valuable assets and had wiped their minds clean of everything that had once been there and wasn't for the express of making them better killers, had trained them extensively- teaching them the other's fighting style and favoured moves until they knew the other as well as themselves. Knowing that if either the Widow or the Soldier ever went rogue their only chance of taking them out lay with the other half of their bloody coin, forged in the ice and cruelty of Soviet Russia.  
"Nat, get out of here" Steve ordered, getting to his feet and catching his breath, preparing to launch himself into the fray and interrupt the fight between his teammates. Not pausing to realise that Natasha wasn't in any danger, she knew the moves of the Soldier, anticipated his actions, understood his thought process, and had new tricks he was unaware of.  
"No, you tried it your way, now it's my turn" She snapped just before the Soldier's metal arm connected with the side of her face and knocked her to the ground, she had forgotten how fast and efficiently he moved, had fallen back into old patterns learned in the harshness and cold of the Red Room.

The fight between the Black Widow and Winter Soldier was as clean as it was brutal, neither wasting time with unnecessary movements or inflicting superfluous injuries. They went for the kill each and every time, and when that failed they gave up on the attempt, changed strategy and went at it again. It was a dance, both partners knowing, ready and waiting, for the moves the other would make. Natasha found it hard to execute any of the moves she had learnt in the years since the Red Room, wanted to smash an elbow into his temple in a favoured move of Clint's, to drive a forearm into his windpipe and follow up with a lightning fast punch to the face as Agent Hill was want to do; yet she seemed unable to vary her attacks, her body moving before her mind could catch up. She was slipping back into the young woman who was the Red Room's protégé, who had been trained, altered, carved up and injected with the Soviet's version of Erskine's Serum, that hateful, idealistic girl devoted to the only place she had ever known; Natasha couldn't afford to be that woman, not now, not ever. She shook herself mentally, deciding that if she had to be one of the versions of herself from her time working for the KGB she would be Yakov's Natalia rather than her handler's Natalia Romanova. Dimly, her mind having to anchor itself to the present, to focus on Cap- unable to find a break in the fighting in which to join, who definitely hadn't been there in the Red Room, so that she didn't forget herself entirely; she remembered the way their handlers had controlled the Soldier, the knowledge that had been removed along with her love for him.

 

"Soldat" Natasha barked "stand down" the Winter Soldier paused, his first set of programming- Hydra orders, activated by the scientist, warring with the controls the Soviets had put into him.  
"That's an order Soldat" very slowly the Soldier lowered the raised arm that was about to strike her.  
"Attention" Natasha snapped, watching the Winter Soldier stand to "at ease" his posture relaxed though he remained focused on Natasha, who stood and took in the scene, the Winter Soldier's gaze fixed on her, Steve and Tony gaping openly at her, and the rest of the Avengers running into the room and skidding to a halt as they saw what was inside. Clint jumped down from the rafters.  
"I've taken out the scientist, let's go home"  
"But-"  
"What-"  
"Let's just leave it for now, Tony you and Banner can snap him out of it when we get back to Avengers Tower alright?" He nodded mutely, dumb founded. They left the compound, the Black Widow ordering the Soldier to "follow".

Once they were safely on the quinjet, everyone studiously ignoring the pair as they tried to make sense of what had happened. Natasha turned to the Soldier.  
"Do you have a mission report?"  
"No"  
"You're not expected to, your mission is complete, you have time between your next assignment and will not be wiped, Comrade Soldier you are dismissed" the blank look disappeared and he tensed up, hands moving to holstered pistols as he took in his surroundings, relaxing only slightly as he saw the person seated next to him.  
"Natalia? What's going on?"  
"Relax James, we're safe here"  
"We are never safe"  
"We are now, we escaped the Red Room, we're in America now"  
"Nat-"  
"It's true, they're removing our programming. They've taken mine out, and are in the process of removing yours, that's why you don't remember" he remained unconvinced  
"I don't... Prove it" The Black Widow smiled and pulled him close, whispering into his ear the words they've never outwardly said to each other. James smiled, a lopsided grin breaking out of his stoic mask for a split second before he tangled his hands in her hair and kissed her. 

There were a series of gasps in the background and someone began laughing. Natasha broke the kiss and flipped them off.  
"Screw you Rogers, I didn't make a deal when you and Stark got together"


End file.
